Document

San Diego’s Convention Center is expected to attract more than 858,000 people heading to annual meetings and trade shows this year, marking the facility’s largest attendance figure since 2008, when the number of attendees approached 1 million.

Total conventions, however, will be down slightly in 2014, as will the number of hotel room nights generated by out-of-town visitors, according to a forecast released this week by the Convention Center Corp.

This year, though, will be notable for a big surge in the number of locals expected to turn out for large trade shows like this week’s Auto Show, the spring home show and Bridal Bazaar. Unlike major conventions, those events don’t attract the kind of mega spending that comes from attendees who stay overnight in hotels, dine out and shop.

Buoyed by major meetings like the American Association for Cancer Research and the American Thoracic Society, convention attendance will grow slightly, to nearly 550,000, compared with last year’s turnout of nearly 525,000.

Comic-Con, as always, will be the biggest draw, attracting some 130,000 attendees, which includes thousands of locals. The pop culture convention is banking on an expansion of the city’s center to draw even more people and exhibitors.

Convention Center impacts

2013

2014

Number of conventions

75

70

Economic impact

$1.3 billion

$1.4 billion

Direct spending

$560.6 million

$606.7 million

Tax revenues

$19 million

$20.6 million

Hotel room nights

704,029

689,841

Out-of-town attendance

524,848

549,400

Source: San Diego Convention Center Corp.

Together, the 70 conventions coming to San Diego this year are expected to yield more than $606 million in direct spending, which is up from last year’s spending figure of more than $560.5 million, the corporation reports.

“It looks like a slow, steady trend upward in terms of incremental attendance for our primary events, and we’re seeing a lot of robust activity in the secondary, short-term market,” said Convention Center Corp. spokesman Steve Johnson. “That’s an indication of the economy overall. A lot of those events dried up post-2008, and they help the facility to generate revenue to help pay for itself and minimize any impact on the city budget.

“That revenue is certainly essential in our ability to invest in upkeep of the building as we mark our 25th anniversary of the original building.”

Especially sought after are lucrative medical meetings, which can draw large numbers of attendees who tend to spend more heavily than the typical conventioneer. In 2014, 15 medical meetings will be coming to San Diego, just one less than last year’s 16.

Because of the cyclical nature of conventions, which rotate their locations from year to year, attendance in San Diego — and the corresponding number of hotel nights they generate — tend to rise and fall from one year to the next. That could change in 2016 and 2017, when overnight stays associated with conventions are projected to jump by as much as 10 percent to 15 percent, Tourism Authority Chief Executive Joe Terzi predicted.

Terzi’s agency in 2012 took over the responsibility of booking long-term conventions, which previously had been overseen by the Convention Center Corp. He noted that many larger associations are still sitting on the sidelines awaiting a final decision on whether the city’s planned expansion of the center will move forward. While it has the approval of the California Coastal Commission, the project still faces legal challenges.

“We still plan to book about 800,000 room nights a year for business out into future years,” Terzi said. “But as soon as there’s confirmation the expansion will move forward, that will grow to more than a million room nights a year.”